All things London, Paris, Lifestyle & Travel

Diseño de Sharona

I bought my first Vespa when I lived in Paris, with the money from my very first ‘grown-up-job’ pay check. Mainly because I loved the idea of cruising through those cute, meandering streets on an adorable looking vehicle. The only hiccup? I had never driven a scooter before, ever.

So there I was, the proud owner of this brand new Italian piece of artwork, with its keys trembling in my hand, mentally preparing to hit the manic streets of Paris. Luckily, one of the guys working at the bike store was friendly enough to give me a little lesson to teach me the basics of scootering, so to speak. Five minutes later I had literally launched the vehicle against the facade of a neighbouring boutique. I remember regretting my ‘stupid purchase’ and wanting to return the Vespa straight away.

Of course I didn’t, and after an initial learning period – with only one other incident – I started to truly enjoy riding that Vespa. I’ve got plenty of great memories involving that little bike; picking up friends from the station, dropping off my boyfriend at Gare du Nord, moving a hoover from one flat to another, even returning a cat to its owners after a weekend of ‘cat-sitting’.

To cut a long story short: I’m a big fan of Vespas – and all things Italian for that matter – which is probably one of the reasons I love this drawing so much. It is definitely why I chose the fierce girl on her Vespa to be the very first feature of Diseño de Sharona.

If you want to see more work of this young, Dutch designer, have a look at her Instagram or Facebook. I’ll feature another one of her designs – perhaps accompanied by a short anecdote again – here next month.